The ''Valley Roadrunner'' is a weekly print newspaper published in

Valley Center, California Valley Center is a census-designated place (CDP) in San Diego County, California, United States. The population was 10,087 at the 2020 census, up from 9,277 at the 2010 census. History In the late 1860s, the area now known as Valley Center was ...

serving Valley Center,

Palomar Mountain Palomar Mountain ( ; ) is a mountain ridge in the Peninsular Ranges in northern San Diego County, California. It is known as the location of Palomar Observatory and Hale Telescope, and known for Palomar Mountain State Park. History The Luise� ...

, Pauma Valley,

Pala Pala may refer to: Places Chad *Pala, Chad, the capital of the region of Mayo-Kebbi Ouest Estonia * Pala, Kose Parish, village in Kose Parish, Harju County * Pala, Kuusalu Parish, village in Kuusalu Parish, Harju County * Pala, Järva County, ...

, and North Escondido,

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

. It was founded in 1974.

History

The newspaper was founded in 1974 by Derek "Van" Quackenbush (1921–2015), a journalism graduate of the

University of Missouri The University of Missouri (Mizzou or MU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri, United States. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus Univers ...

who had founded and owned several local newspapers in Minnesota and Illinois prior to settling in San Diego County. According to one of its long-time editors, David Ross, the ''Roadrunner'' name was suggested by Quackenbush's father who had seen "something running around" and the floor of his canning factory. Van Quakenbush sold the paper to Dale and Shirley Good in 1992 who ran it for the next 20 years. In 2012, the ''Valley Roadrunner'' was bought by Eric Buskirk whose company Verican produced software for newspapers and also owned ''The Henderson Press'' in Nevada and ''The Valley Chronicle'' in

Hemet, California Hemet is a city in the San Jacinto Valley in Riverside County, California, United States. It covers a total area of , about half of the valley, which it shares with the neighboring city of San Jacinto, California, San Jacinto. The population w ...

. According to Buskirk, the paper was near folding at the time he purchased it with a 50% fall in its revenues from its heyday. Buskirk began cutting the workforce and outsourcing some of the paper's production to China. These developments led to the resignation in 2013 of Ross, the paper's principle editor, who had written most of the paper's articles for the previous 25 years. In September 2015, the paper was purchased by Justin Salter, and Ross returned to its editorship. Ross celebrated 40 years of working at the ''Valley Roadrunner'' in May 2024.

Awards

In 2008, the paper's journalists won 7 San Diego Press Club awards in the "Humour", "Breaking news", "Best news website", and "Commentary" categories for non-daily papers. The paper's other local journalism awards include: *2008 San Diego Society of Professional Journalists James Julian Memorial Prize for Patsy Fritz's fire coverage. *2007 San Diego Society of Professional Journalists Awards in the "Investigative/Enterprise story" and "Opinion/Editorial" categories *2006 San Diego Society of Professional Journalists Herbert Lockwood "Woody" Award for humorous writing.

References

External links

* {{Portal bar, California, Journalism Weekly newspapers published in California Mass media in San Diego County, California Companies based in San Diego County, California Escondido, California Valley Center, California Newspapers established in 1974 1974 establishments in California